Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Electronic Music

Imagine the Casiotone (with other higher-end synthesizer-oriented electronic musical instruments) begatting modern electronic music. The story of this genre would be a story about technology turning in on itself through the medium of music wherein it expresses something essential about itself: That it must evolve or risk dying. When a technology reaches some perceived peak, such as the printing press and paper, that technology, it is thought, risks and awaits eradication. If it cannot be improved upon, it eventually will be outmoded. This truth is expressed at the micro-level in electronic music--a genre in which the triumph is to achieve a seamless transition from one piece of music into another piece, eventually rendering the first piece unrecognizable and forgotten, its sonic identity at once consumed and carried on in subsequent arrangements.

I don't like or listen to this music.